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Talking Heads

"Sophmoric. Juvenile. Low art." Bill Watterson used Calvin and Hobbes to illustrate some of the most insightful commentaries on art (the snowmen sculpture strips in particular) I've ever come across. I learned as much about aesthetics from him as I did in an upper division course on the subject (I was a philosophy major).

I think he retired, in part, because of his increasing frustration with the artistically stifling format of the daily newspaper strip. This makes me feel some measure of guilt, since the web format allows for all manner of McCloudian freedom, and yet we've been sticking to a fairly stodgy 2 x 2 panel format. I realize today's strip isn't really "haha" funny, but it's cathartically amusing to me. Vargas and I are still figuring this "web strip" thing out, and it's a sort of self-deprecating apology for not being funnier. As Calvin would say, "It's secretly ironic."

We're making a concerted effort to make upcoming strips more dynamic, and it's funny how much I had to fight Vargas during the execution of this strip. I had to make Vargas redo the strip because he put too much effort into it. He did his best to make panels 1-3 energetic, with varying facial expressions and gestures and so on. I explained that we needed exactly identical panels to make the joke work. Then, he looks me straight in the eye, in full seriousness, and says to me, "Panel 4 is even more artistically restricting."

One "Oldie" Left

I bet y'all have noticed that the art seems to change from time to time. Well, as many of you (all of our 10 fans) have probably already figured, we have many strips drawn in advance to give us buffer for emergencies like illness or laziness.

During our couple of months prior to going live (and for the first month even) I was seriously struggling due to a) not having seriously drawn in ages, and b) having to make a complete style change from what I was used to for this strip. Well, after this comic, we have but 1 more to go of the "older" strips before we have nothing but "newer" strips where I seem to have a handle on the style.

So now I can sit back, relax, and know that all the strips I was sometimes ashamed of are all behind me :)